Kokomo Tribune - Thursday, May 06, 2010

Kokomo — In what has been a year of firsts for Eastern girls, the track and field team added to the list with its first Howard County championship in impressive fashion Wednesday at Taylor High School.

The Comets, with 10 first-place finishes, totaled 91 points to top Northwestern (72), Western (71) and the host Titans (9).

And once again, right in the thick of things, was Eastern’s outstanding freshman class — led by twins Brittany and Bethany Neeley, who also led the Comets to their first Mid-Indiana Conference and sectional titles in cross country last fall.

Coach Michael Goodspeed, ecstatic over the infusion of depth and athleticism the Class of 2013 has provided, hopes for more this season. The MIC meet is Tuesday at Western High School and the Madison-Grant Sectional, where another first awaits, is the following week.

“There’s a whole class of freshmen who have allowed our team to win county for the first time ever, and we hope some first-evers to come,” said Goodspeed. “They are such a hard-working bunch — very talented, obviously — and I couldn’t be more pleased.”

The Comets made it a clean sweep for Eastern, capturing the boys meet with 102 points, including winning four of five field events. Defending champion Western had its long string of titles halted with 79 points, followed by Northwestern (38) and Taylor (25).

Brittany Neeley collected four victories on the evening, beginning with a come-from-behind win in the 4x800 relay (10:28.69), anchoring Joy Summers, Lindsay Reprogle and Emily Wilcox.

Brittany Neeley added wins in the 400 (1:01.5), the 200 (27.29) and the 4x400 (4:14.4), along with Wilcox, Bethany Neeley and Zoe Wolfe.

All Bethany Neeley could manage was first in the 100 hurdles (:16.31), first in the 800 (2:23.8) and second in long jump as well as the 4x400.

Wilcox won the 1,600-meter run in 5:50.7 with freshman Sarah Wagner second. Wagner captured the 3,200 in 13:03.3.

Wolfe defended her titles in high jump (5-2) and the 300 hurdles (:50.3) and ran a leg of the second-place 4x100 relay team.

Wolfe, a junior who was a state qualifier last season, said what the newcomers like the Neeleys bring to the team is simple: fun.

“It’s fun to have other girls on the team that care as much [as I do] and who will put in all the work you’re putting in,” she said. “[The difference this season is] just to know we can put a girl in a spot and she’s reliable.

“It’s really exciting to have a team that’s good all around. Winning is great. I think because we are doing better as a team everybody is really motivated to do better themselves. It’s been an exciting season so far.”

The Lady Tigers picked up three wins as Amanda Kuffel (:13.33) won the 100-meter dash and was second in the 200. Kara DeFabritis (16-6) won long jump and Allie Combs (108-5) won discus.

Coach Mary Clem gave credit to the Comets but noted several of her girls were under the weather.

“[Eastern] got the job done but unfortunately we had some girls who were sick,” Clem said. “It hurt us so we just went out and did the best we could. We’ll rest them up and get ready for [next week].”

Breanna Cable captured shot put for the Lady Panthers with a heave of 34 feet, 91⁄2 inches and was second in discus. Corinna Cottingham (9-9) won pole vault and the team of Alleca Kerker, Allison Everetts, Taylor Young and Jennifer Dale won the 4x100 relay in 52.8 seconds.

“Our girls came in to improve our times and raise our efforts, and I was pleased with the way they stepped up,” said Western coach Marvin Boswell. “We’ll come back and see what we can do in the conference next week.”

Double winner: Western senior Austin Young competes in the boys
1,600 run. Young swept the 1,600 and 3,200 runs. KT photo

Boys meet

The Eastern boys have yet to be defeated outdoors this year, hearkening back to their last championship season in 1998 that also included conference and sectional titles.

“I did a lot of thinking about some of the things that might have gone wrong [Wednesday] night, and these kids surprise me every time,” said longtime coach Paul Nicholson. “Every big meet, they have come up with something I didn’t expect and it was positive. They are just winners.

“We have some young people who are finding out who they are in this sport, and now they are hungry for [success]. That makes coaching a dream. They’ve been too much fun. A coach shouldn’t enjoy it like this.”

Except for relays, no one was a double winner for the Comets, yet their depth across the board was evident.

Senior Mitch Padfield ran two winning relays and helped Eastern sweep the 800-meter run, winning in 2:01.9 over teammates Hansen Martin and Caleb Gibson.

Those three teamed with Sam Clark to win the 4x800 relay in 8:25.76 while Martin and Padfield combined with Dylan Buck and Brett Buckmaster to capture the 4x400 in 3:32.1.

Buckmaster mastered the 400 in 51.86 seconds while Cale Roark won the 100 in 11.14 seconds and was third in the 200.

The Comets were outstanding in the field as Kelly Kingseed got things rolling with his win in long jump (19-101⁄2 ) and Blake Donson did likewise in discus (155-5). Braden Barnett (6-2) was a surprise, winning high jump, while Kevin Jackson was no surprise winning pole vault (14-6).

Donson was also second in shot put, Blake Thomas third in long jump and Joey Price fourth in discus, where the Panthers could manage only a fifth-place finish. In all, Eastern outscored Western 37-24 in the field — typically a Panther stronghold.

“I thought we could have brought a little more in the field events, but on the track our kids came out and gave a good effort,” Boswell said.

Indy Mathew, in addition to placing second in long jump and third in the 110-meter high hurdles, outdueled Taylor senior Austen Conwell in the 300 hurdles to win in 40.5 seconds.

Mathew also helped the team of James Davis, Jacob Hopkins and Lucas Luckey win the 4x100 relay in 44.8 seconds.

Conwell was able to defend his title in the 110 hurdles in 15.28 seconds.

“Indy Mathew, boy, he ran hard,” said Boswell. “He’s really been gearing up for this [meet]. Any time he races Austen there’s just great competition. It was an exciting race.”

Austin Young captured both the 1,600 (4:36.5) and the 3,200 (10:02.9) for the Panthers, also the defending MIC champs.

“We’ve got to go [home] and rethink some things and get geared up,” said Boswell. “I think when you spread [the points] out over eight [MIC] teams instead of four, it scores a little differently. We think we’ve got a good plan.”

Cory Rupert captured the 200-meter dash for the Tigers in 23.3 seconds and was second to Roark in the 100. Andy Hunkeler won shot put with a toss of 48 feet, 4 inches.

“I was proud of Cory and a lot of guys’ efforts,” coach Dave Stevens said. “Andy’s shot put was tremendous. We’re looking forward to conference.

“No surprises,” Stevens added of the Comets’ domination. “They’ve built a solid program and are very well-coached. They deserved what they got [Wednesday].”